Difficulties in Translating Films

Nowadays there is a great number of foreign films that is imported in our country. As their original titles are mostly written in English, they have to be translated. A film title plays a great role in understanding the film in general and the information contained in it. Consequently, a translator must be very attentive while translating the movie title to make it as sonorous as the original one. It is very interesting to perform this kind of translation, and we decided to choose this subject for our course paper. We made an investigation in it and we tried to discover some difficulties in translating the film titles. In our time film is a very important art form. It reflects our life, culture, world and our vision of world. Films entertain, educate, enlighten and inspire audience. The foreign films give to the target audience the possibility to know something new about the people and culture of that country, which produced these films. With regard to the fact that the main function of film titles is to say something general about the whole movie, the film titles are also very important. If the picture is imported, its title should be translated to make it more understandable for the target audience. The art of translation is a very difficult art; it shows us that one and the same original text may have a lot of translations. The difficulty for us is to use the one of them, which would suit the situation best of all. The same difficulty appears when we deal with movie titles, sometimes the original title is absolutely different from the translation we are given. The explanation may be very simple; the Russian translation may be better understood by Russian-speaking community, than the original variant of the title. The work of finding a better and a more suitable translation is very difficult but at the same time very interesting. So, let us enter the world of translating the movie titles. The film title in the publicist discourse functions as the identification of the actor or the film director, what is realized in corresponding communicative pass. Such identification is often concerned with the characters visualization and the appearance of the actor-performer. The most successful this step is in the case when there is a great need to identificate the foreign player, which is not very famous. The inexactitudes in the film titles translations may cause the communicative failure, because many difficulties often appear when identificating one or another film. The observations show that the titles of foreign feature (as well as the animation and the documentary) films in the modern publicist editions mostly appear in the bilingual variant. Thus the translations of film titles represent the vast material for the analysis of the types of equivalence, interference, speech mistakes. The titles modified and transformed during the translation and the motivated steps aside from the title in the source language represent an interest also in the aspect of identification and comparison of translation tendencies. The comparative analysis shows that during the translation of movie titles the adaptations of different kinds may be observed. Comedy Movie Titles A comedy film is a film laced with humor or that may seek to provoke laughter from the audience. Along with drama, horror and science fiction, comedy is one of the largest genres of the medium. There are different types of comedies. For example, a comedy of manners satirizes the manners and affectations of a social class, often represented by stock characters. The plot of the comedy is often concerned with an illicit love affair or some other scandal, but is generally less important than its witty dialogue. In a fish-out-of-water comedy film the main character finds himself in an alien environment and this drives most of the humor in the film. A parody or spoof film is a comedy that satirizes other film genres or classic films. Such films employ sarcasm, stereotyping, mockery of scenes from other films, and the obviousness of meaning in a character's actions. The anarchic comedy film uses nonsensical, stream-of-consciousness humor which often lampoons some form of authority. Films of this nature stem from a theatrical history of anarchic comedy on the stage. The romantic comedy sub-genre typically involves the development of a relationship between a man and a woman. The stereotyped plot line follows the "boygets-girl", "boy-loses-girl", "boy-gets-girl-back-again" sequence. Babe, the gallant pig (Babe, cel mai curajos porc din lume) Good neighbor, Sam (Bunul meu vecin Sam) Silver Linings Playbook (Scenariu pentru happy-end) Keeping the Faith Preotul, rabinul si fata Seven Psychopaths Sapte psihopati si un caine

Horror Movie Titles Films from the horror genre are designed to elicit fright, fear, terror, disgust or horror from viewers. In horror film plots, evil forces, events, or characters, sometimes of supernatural origin, intrude into the everyday world. Horror film characters include vampires, zombies, monsters, serial killers, and a range of other fear-inspiring characters. Early horror films often drew inspiration from characters and stories from classic literature, such as Dracula, Frankenstein, The Mummy, The Wolf Man, The Phantom of the Opera and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Horror films have been criticized for their graphic violence and dismissed by film critics as low budget B-movies and exploitation films. Nonetheless, some major studios and respected directors have made forays into the genre, and more recent generations of critics have analyzed horror films. Some horror films draw on other genres, such as science fiction, fantasy, black comedy, and thrillers. The Midnight Meat Train (Metroul groazei) The haunting in Connecticut (Misterele casei bintuite) Ravenous Placerea de a ucide The Haunting Castelul ciudat Resident Evil: Retribution Resident Evil: Rasplata Action Movie Titles Action films, or movies, are a film genre, where action sequences, such as fighting, stunts, car chases or explosions, take precedence over elements like characterisation or complex plotting. The action typically involves individual efforts on the part of the hero, as contrasted with most war films. The genre is closely linked with the thriller and adventure film genres. The phenomenal success of the James Bond series in the 1960s and 1970s, helped to popularise the concept of the action film in recent years. Action films tend to be expensive requiring big budget special effects and stunt work. Action films have mainly become a mostly-American genre, although there have been a significant number of action films from Hong Kong which are primarily modern variations of the martial arts film. Because of these roots, Hong Kong action films typically center on acrobatics by the protagonist while American action films typically feature big explosions and modern technology. Death Race Cursa mortala The Crow: Salvation Corbul: Mantuirea Men in black Barbati in negru The Italian Job Jaf in stil italian Melodramatic Movie Titles Since the dawn of tragedy, in which there was often an element of otherworldly force (god, gods, or fate) melodrama became the main type of film, together with comedy. In fact, arguably, all films can be either melodramas or comedies. There are several types of melodramas: patriarchal melodrama- a melodrama in which issues of man (male) are discussed, often his relationship with his children, his attempts to make a career, etc. Matriarchal melodrama usually discusses relationship between mother and her daughter. Social melodrama attempts to focus on social issues, social injustice. The help (culoarea sentimentelor) Tuck Everlasting Barbatul in costum galben The Human Stain Culoarea minciunii Love Me if You Dare Iubeste-ma daca poti Million Dollar Baby O fata de milioane Adventure and Historical Movie Titles The adventure film is a film genre which has been a popular one in the history of cinema. Although the genre is not clearly defined, adventure films are usually set in the past or sometimes in a fantasy world, and often involve swordfighting or swashbuckling. Unlike the modern action film, which often takes place in a city, with the hero battling drug cartels or terrorists, there is an element of romanticism attached to the adventure genre. Popular subjects have included: Robin Hood, Zorro, pirates or the novels of Alexandre Dumas. The genre probably reached the peak of its popularity in Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s. The historical movie is a film genre in which stories are based upon historical events and famous persons. Some historical films attempt to accurately portray a historical event or biography, to the degree that the available historical research will allow. Other historical movies are fictionalized tales that are based on an actual person and their deeds. Game Change Jocul se schimba War Horse Calul de Lupta Atilla the Hun Atila Hunul

Total Recall Memorie programata Ice Age: Continental Drift Epoca de gheata 4: Continente in deriva The Expendables 2 Eroi de sacrificiu 2 Madagascar 3: Europes Most Wanted Madagascar 3: Fugariti prin Europa It is undoubtful that the film title should be connected in some way to the film itself. In ideal case the title determines the movies principal subject, which becomes a reference point of everything that happens on the screen. Especially looks strange that title, which cannot be deciphered, even having watched the film till the end. In such cases, the spectator has the feeling of bewilderment after the watching: May be Ive lost something, if I dont understand the film title?. The situation may be intensified, if the title is translated from another language. Here the difficulties appear. Therefore the translator, while translating the film title must be very careful and attentive. He/she must know all the techniques of this kind of translation and must use all his/her imagination to transmit the meaning of film title, as close to the original, as possible. So, we have revealed several difficulties of movie titles translation: The difficulty to choose the convenient translation between many synonymic variants The difficulty when the Russian variant is absolutely changed to make it closer to the target audience The difficulty when the Russian translation is adapted to the audience by the help of Russian language setexpressions, which are more understandable by these people The difficulty when the official translation isnt so much suitable as one of the possible translation variants The difficulty when the official Russian translation differs in style in language from the original one The difficulty when the film title translation doesnt coincide with the genre of the original film title, and it must be adapted to this particular genre by some modifications